Call It a Gift
by SnakEve
Summary: Set before Goren became a detective, this is supposed to be the one time he came across something he couldn't explain. I've speculated about his past from clues in CI. First attempt at fanfic do your worst


Call it a gift but Goren was especially good at questioning. It seemed like a typical case. A murder in a wealthy neighborhood had brought out all the residents in the halls of the apartment complex. Goren had questioning duties like always. He was going through the routine as he had one hundred times before. "Where were you? Did you hear or see anything unusual?" Though he spoke almost without thinking, his mind was hearing everything and seeing everything. A slight twitch of the shoulders and he would store it in his memory. Already he had been noticed for his fantastic memory. He never forgot anything. He had promise his partner Jackson said, to almost anyone who would listen. Anyone who could remember all those faces had to be on his way up.  
  
Goren usually laughed this stuff off. They didn't know that memory was easy for him. Always had been. He had a true photographic memory. The kind that only comes with genius level IQ's. Call it a gift. They didn't know that about him and he like it that way. The less they knew the better.  
  
He came to the last apartment on the hall. An old woman was standing at the entrance waiting for him. She pursed her lips in a faintly disapproving way. She was wearing a faded red terry cloth bathrobe. There was a small white stain on the left shoulder. Her hair was up in curlers and she wore pink slippers, not the fuzzy kind.  
  
"Good evening ma'am. We've had some trouble up the hall and I was wondering if I could ask you a few questions." He smiled in an attempt to charm her. She didn't look friendly at all.  
  
"You'll be wanting to talk to my daughter, Rose. She knew that man. She warned him two days ago about all this. It's a pity he didn't listen."  
  
"Is Rose at home?" This sounded promising.  
  
"No, she works at night. She'll be back around six in the morning." He wrote it down in his notebook. "You can just talk to me then, young man. I've stayed up late enough." She slammed the door on his face. Goren blinked at it. It was 3 am now. He knew he could waste another three hours at this crime seen and then question this old lady and her daughter then. Or he could finish up and have the detectives talk with her. Something as unusual as this should immediately be reported and handled by them.  
  
On the other hand, Goren was incredibly curious to meet this woman and find out for himself. He knew he was taking a risk, but it could also get him noticed a lot faster than just piddling around waiting for eligibility to be a detective.  
  
At six o' clock Goren was waiting in the hall. A lot of the commotion had cleared out, though the homicide detectives and the major case squad were still messing around in the crime scene. Goren was sipping some coffee though he was hardly tired. He was reciting a Japanese waka poem to himself. He had a knack for languages. He could pick them up almost as if he were remembering them rather than learning them. Japanese was fascinating to him at the moment.  
  
He was holding the Styrofoam cup to his lips and thinking of the correct verb conjugation of "to die" when a beautiful young woman walked into the hall. She glanced at the door of the victim's apartment and closed her eyes, shaking her head. She looked over at him and paused. Goren had frozen in the act of drinking his coffee and his eyes were wide open, staring at her. He immediately looked down and took his coffee cup away from his lips.  
  
"What happened here?" She asked. She was wearing a black overcoat and slacks. She looked tired, but hardly as rumpled as he would have guessed at 6 am. He had guessed that Rose had to be older too. From the age of her mother he was expecting a middle aged woman. Rose looked about his age. She had dark brown hair and dark brown eyes. She wasn't very tall, but the way she carried herself made her seem taller.  
  
"I'm afraid one of your neighbors was killed last night." He watched her reaction closely. She sighed as if in defeat. "Are you Rose Banks?"  
  
She looked up at him sharply. "I am."  
  
"Could I ask you a few questions? About your neighbor?"  
  
"I suppose so. Have you questioned everyone on this floor?"  
  
"It's routine."  
  
"Ok, follow me." She led him down the hall and to her apartment. "I suppose you already questioned my mother?"  
  
"I tried, she told me to talk to you."  
  
"She would." Rose ushered him in and waved him to a seat in the living room. She hung up her coat, a dark blue blouse underneath, and went into to the kitchen. The coffee maker had gone off and she fixed herself a cup. Goren could see everything she did over the bar. She ran her fingers through her dark hair. He did not take a seat just yet, but got out his notebook and jotted the date and time on a new sheet. She came in and settled herself on the loveseat.  
  
"Fire away."  
  
"Did you know Sam Johnston very well?"  
  
"No, hardly at all."  
  
Goren raised an eyebrow. He bent slightly at the waist to look at her more directly. "Really? Your mother seemed to think you knew him quite well."  
  
"Well, you know mothers, any single man is marriage fodder. Even if they are gay. She wishes I did." She didn't meet his eye for very long.  
  
He bent lower and cocked his head slightly. He smiled. "She seemed to think that you warned him about this."  
  
She looked up at him sharply. She looked right back into his eyes. He waited.  
  
"Sit down, detective." She gestured to the couch across from him.  
  
He took his seat still smiling. "I'm not a detective. I'm just a lieutenant." He smoothed his uniform out when he sat down. He set his coffee cup on the coffee table between them.  
  
"You're not a detective, yet." She sipped her coffee, still not taking her eyes off of him. "My mother should have kept her mouth shut. I can't tell you anything that will help you. I can't tell you anything you'll believe."  
  
"Why wouldn't I believe it?" He had something. He could feel it. This woman knew something.  
  
"Most people don't believe it." She sighed. "I don't suppose she told you what I do for a living?"  
  
"No."  
  
"I work at an institute. They are studying my dreams right now, so I go there at night. But in general, they are studying my brain, because they are interested in psychic phenomena. I'm a psychic. Call it a gift."  
  
Goren laughed. He couldn't stop himself. It came out before he even had a chance to think about it. He would have to watch that in the future.  
  
Rose merely smiled. "I told you, you wouldn't believe it."  
  
"I'm sorry. It has been a long night," he regained control of himself. "So you warned Sam Johnston because of a psychic intuition?" He was thinking that even if it was a wash, at least he had gotten a good laugh.  
  
"Yes, I felt that something bad was coming for him about two days ago." She watched Goren writing in his notebook. Her face flashed briefly with anger. She reached out and snatched his coffee cup from the coffee table. It has nearly empty but she held it tightly in both hands.  
  
Goren had looked up the instant she moved. He watched her close her eyes in concentration. She began to speak very quickly.  
  
"Bobby, little Bobby. Not your mother's favorite, she liked James best. But he's got something wrong, something very wrong. He's gone schizo. And Bobby has to watch him at home. This hit sometime while you were in high school. You had to commit your brother and it tore your family apart. That's why you went into psychology. You thought you could help families like yours. And you were afraid too. If this could happen to James then it could happen to you. More than likely even. And you were damn good too. Genius level IQ. But you hated the field. No one was interested in helping people, just in diagnosing them. And James hung himself. That was it. You quit without getting your masters. A criminology class you had taken a long time ago. That sounded good. You decided you could help better as a police officer, maybe a detective. That's why you're here. Hoping you could get noticed at least. You could build a reputation."  
  
He felt as though he had been punched hard in the gut. No one around here knew that kind of information. Absolutely no one. He gaped at her. She opened her eyes and looked at him sadly, as if she were about to burst into tears.  
  
"And you liked me. You thought I was beautiful."  
  
Goren stood up. He felt dizzy for a second, but regained control. He was vaguely aware of muttering some kind of apology and he left quickly.  
  
Out in the hallway he felt as if he were going to throw up. He raced down the hall, and down the stairs. He nearly fell twice before he got out of the building and around to the alley. He heaved, but nothing came. He tensed and waited. There was no more coming. He stood and looked around. No one had seen him, though he had already formulated an excuse of the stomach virus.  
  
He had lost control. He felt ashamed. But then something like that would have shaken any man. He walked back to the front of the building. It was time to go off duty. He felt relieved for that at least. 


End file.
